EU and U.N. considering force for Darfur refugees in Chad

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The European Union and the United Nations are considering sending troops and police to protect Darfur refugees and other homeless people in neighboring Chad, a senior U.N. official said on Friday.

Stressing that talks were still in the preliminary stage, Jean-Marie Guehenno, the undersecretary-general in charge of peacekeeping, told reporters the United Nations was studying a U.N. Security Council resolution for Chad.

This would authorize a European military force and a "multidimensional U.N. mission with a strong police component to address the security situation ... in the refugee camps and the internally displaced people," he said.

Guehenno, a Frenchman, said he was traveling to Brussels next week for discussions with EU officials.

In Darfur, at least 200,000 people are estimated to have died and 2.1 million chased from their homes since the conflict flared in 2003, when African rebels took up arms against the Arab-dominated Khartoum government in a fight over resources.

Eastern Chad has some 230,000 Sudanese refugees and 120,000 of its own citizens chased from villages along the border with Sudan's Darfur, mainly by pro-Sudan government militia. Most live in arid camps in the impoverished country.

France last month asked the EU to send up to 12,000 troops to Chad to set up a humanitarian corridor to Darfur refugees but the EU has not responded yet.

Javier Solana, the EU foreign policy chief, said on Thursday he had met French President Nicolas Sarkozy to discuss various international crises, including the Darfur conflict.

In an interview with the French La Crois newspaper, Solana said he and Sarkozy "talked about the possibility of deploying rapidly, in cooperation with the president of Chad, a temporary European Union force" to protect the camps in Chad.

He said EU troops would stay in Chad until the arrival of a joint United Nations and African Union force in Darfur, not anticipated until well into next year.

EU foreign ministers are due to discuss Sudan when they next meet on July 23, looking at what the EU can do to support an existing AU force in the region and what could be done in Chad, an EU official said in Brussels.

Faced with large numbers of refugees arriving from Darfur, and struggling to contain violence linked to the Darfur conflict and a domestic rebellion, Chad has repeatedly called for international assistance to protect refugees but until recently has balked at a military force.

(Added reporting by Crispian Balmer in Paris)